Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati's sinister trick

According to reports, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati is using state intelligence units to choose her party's candidates for the assembly elections.

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Mail Today Bureau

New Delhi

January 4, 2012

UPDATED: January 4, 2012 10:37 IST

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati seems to have taken the misuse of government machinery to buttress the poll prospects of the ruling party to a new level in India's most populous state. According to reports she is using state intelligence units to choose her party's candidates for the assembly elections.

In what appears to be a sinister move, the Bahujan Samaj Party government is allegedly even employing its machinery to pressure candidates most likely to win to join their party.

Considering that the model code of conduct is already in force in the state, this is a matter that must be looked into seriously by the Election Commission of India. District officials who are willing to act as pollsters for the ruling party can hardly be expected to conduct the poll process fairly, and the EC must seek their removal.

But the larger issue here is of our governments habitually misusing intelligence agencies for petty political purposes. This ensures that the task of genuine intelligence gathering, critical for checking crime and terror activities, gets the short shrift.

Here, Ms Mayawati seems to have picked a leaf out of the book of the central government which, recent reports have revealed, makes the Intelligence Bureau devote a large chunk of its resources on political tasks rather than security duties.